"They expressed themselves," as Baillie, the
Scotch Presbyterian commissioner, wrote sadly, "for toleration, not only
to themselves, but to all sects." In February of the same year, the
Oxford Clergy, who had been consulted by the King as to the limits of
possible concession, gave strong evidence that the pressure of events
were forcing them to move, even though slowly, in the same direction.
(See Gardiner, _History of the Civil War_, vol. ii. pp. 125-126.)
APPENDIX C
WHAT MAY BE THOSE PARTICULAR LAWS, OR SUCH A METHOD OF LAWS, WHEREBY A
COMMONWEALTH MAY BE GOVERNED?
1. The bare letter of the Law established by Act of Parliament shall be
the Rule for Officers and People, and the chief Judge of all actions.
2. He or they who add or diminish from the Law, excepting in the Court
of Parliament, shall be cashiered his Office, and never bear Office
more.
3. No man shall administer the Law for Money or Reward. He that doth
shall die as a Traitor to the Commonwealth. For when Money must buy and
sell Justice, and bear all the sway, there is nothing but Oppression to
be expected.
[Here, as also in other Laws yet to follow, Winstanley, and as it
seems to us without sufficient grounds, gives up the position taken
up in The New Law of Righteousness, that capital punishment was
absolutely unjustifiable.]
4. The Laws shall be read by the Minister to the People four times in
the year, viz.
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